Meteora, Greece

Six hundred or more years ago, monks in this area of northern Greece were being persecuted and killed by bandits. For self-protection, they scaled these monolithic rock outcroppings and, using simple pulleys, hoisted up building materials from the valley floor far below and actually built themselves a series of monasteries to live in. If memory serves, there were 28 of them in all, but only three of them remain intact today — and two of those can be visited by tourists: one by climbing the stone steps carved into the rock during the 1930s and the other by walking across a narrow wooden bridge thrown up around the same time.

I first stumbled across Meteora in 1980, when I was returning to Amsterdam from the first of my two terms teaching in Greece for the University of Maryland's European Division. I was navigating with maps from the ANWB, the Dutch equivalent of our AAA, and I learned that place names printed in green were invariably well worth a visit. I knew nothing about Meteora except that it was the only place in northern Greece that got the ANWB's green rating, so I detoured off the beaten path to take a look. And wow — if I was drawing the maps, I'd've made up a brand new color for Meteora. Supergreen.

I went back in 1982, with my buddy Rudi, on my way south this time towards my second Maryland-in-Greece semester, and he was as impressed by Meteora's beauty as I was. It's been 20 years since that second visit — but I know I'll get back for a third look one of these days....

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